Hopkins & Kingsley to be Honored at CineVegas Festival

On the heels of announcing that veteran producer Jerry Weintraub will be given the Vanguard Producer Award after screening Ocean's Thirteen during the opening night festivities, the CineVegas Film Festival will honor four other entertainment icons spanning two hemispheres, it was announced today by Trevor Groth, Artistic Director. On Friday, June 15, the Marquee Award will be given to Sir Anthony Hopkins (whose film Slipstream will screen at the festival), the Vanguard Actor Award to Sir Ben Kingsley, the Vanguard Director Award to Mike Newell (Four Weddings and a Funeral), and the Half-Life Award to Charlize Theron (Oscar-winner for Monster) at the Honorees Reception.
 
"We are incredibly blessed to gather such talent in one spot for the purpose of recognizing their collective work," stated Groth.  "The excitement of Sir Anthony Hopkins, Sir Ben Kingsley, Mike Newell and Charlize Theron coming together at this year's CineVegas will truly be a weekend, and a year, to remember."
 
The Festival's closing night film is You Kill Me, the forthcoming thriller from director John Dahl (Joy Ride, The Last Seduction, Rounders), starring Kingsley, Téa Leoni, Luke Wilson and Bill Pullman.  It follows an alcoholic hit man (Kingsley) who heads to California to take a break from his bad habits, taking a job at a mortuary, and becoming romantically involved with the stepdaughter (Leoni) of a corpse he's embalming.
 
Sir Anthony Hopkins, once an understudy to Sir Laurence Olivier, first distinguished himself in such feature films as A Lion in Winter, A Bridge Too Far, The Elephant Man and 84 Charing Cross Road, winning an Oscar for his role as Hannibal Lecter in The Silence of the Lambs. Through the '90s he received two Best Actor Oscar nominations for The Remains of the Day and Nixon, and a Best Supporting Actor Oscar nomination for his role in Amistad, as well as starred in such films as Desperate Hours, Howard's End, Legends of the Fall, Surviving Picasso, The Mask of Zorro and Instinct.  During this decade he reprised his role as Hannibal Lecter in Hannibal and The Red Dragon while creating characters in Alexander, Proof, Bobby, All the King's Men and Fracture.  He recently completed filming Beowulf, in which he stars as King Hrothgar.  Hopkins also recently wrote and directed the independent feature Slipstream, which premiered at the 2007 Sundance Film Festival. 
 
Sir Ben Kingsley, whose theatre credits include Volpone at the Royal National Theatre, earned the Best Actor Academy Award for Richard Attenborough's Gandhi in 1982.  He earned three additional Oscar nominations during the following two decades for Bugsy, Sexy Beast and House of Sand and Fog, along with a BAFTA nomination for Schindler's List.  Among his other roles are those in Turtle Diary, Maurice, Pascali's Island, Without a Clue, Sneakers, Dave (as Vice President to Kevin Kline's hapless President Mitchell), Searching for Bobby Fischer, Species, Rules of Engagement and Tuck Everlasting.  More recently, Kingsley has lent his enormous talents to Thunderbirds, Suspect Zero, A Sound of Thunder, Oliver Twist (as Fagin) and Lucky Number Slevin, among other projects.

"The 9th Annual CineVegas Film Festival will be held June 6-16, 2007 at the Palms Casino Resort in Las Vegas, highlighting the most exciting offerings from up and coming filmmakers and visionary veterans. Sponsored by the Palms Casino Resort, the Greenspun Media Group, Vegas.com and Condé Nast Traveler, the 2007 festival will combine the glamour and energy of world premiere films and the intensity of in-depth celebrity tributes set against the backdrop of Sin City. Robin Greenspun serves as the festival's President, Trevor Groth serves as Artistic Director and Dennis Hopper serves as the Chairman of the Creative Advisory Board," state press notes.

For complete program details and to purchase passes, please call 1-888-8VEGAS8 or visit www.cinevegas.com.

Photo of Anthony Hopkins by Retna Ltd.